MORE THAN ‘reason’, there’s ‘need’ to catch up with him. One reason being weariness that keeps layering up in running about, grocery-shopping, returning phone calls, knocking mails into some Net addresses…. Breath keeps losing itself. And we aren’t talking just the kind that pumps that thing called the heart. Well… pretty close to his heart stays this guy. Follows it, walks along it… wherever it takes him. And today, it also earns him a living…. Man, that’s a chilled out life… He laughs – Diwan Manna, our man of the lens, fresh from more journeying. And the most recent behind-the-lens with him has happened October through November in Indonesia with all its surprises, besides walking him down the neon-blinking Singapore with its dash of America. “A friend, working with this company coming up with the first car in Indonesia, had shown my work to these guys and the next thing that came floating in was an invitation to do corporate clicking for them.” He’s been clicking away at textiles, heavy machinery, their massive garment industry, huge turbines…. havy –duty material stuff… And he? Romancing up some cold, cold metal. “Now I’d be going back soon to catch the rest of Indonesia,” the bit that intrigued him, amused, saddened too… Like poverty. “Those guys are so hard-up; the streets, dirty…. It’s not such a delicacy for the eyes.” That could make for some soul-searching on the hindsight. But yes, there’s lot of delicacy to pick up and set afloat into the palate… “The kind of seafood they dish out is not a joke… & light on the pocket enough for the locals to eat out most meals. But, you aren’t a veggie, are you? Veggies can forget about Indonesia…. And this Muslim-thick country somehow springs a surprise. They hardly look Muslim… I mean the kind of modernity and look they wear about…. You’d never know.” And yes, “the women are very pretty. The sad part is… there’re many bought & sold.” And this, we suggest, he could capture on the lens. He wonders… nodding. “let’s see. After finishing of my assignments. I may just take off… across this ‘row’ of a country (its cities stand down a road it seems….) go lens-grab some of its 100 live volcanoes, natural springs & then I don’t know what else… I don’t know what I’d return with.” And Singapore? Not too sold out… “Yeah… clothes, electronics, food… but I wonder if my camera would be that eager,” he winks.
You never know Diwan… a camera catches a flicker faster than its man sometimes and before he knows it… he might be telling a story without knowing it… And we might be getting another series from him before he knows it…
